The looming food crisis - Rush for biofuels is taking a toll on food crops

[entanglement]

From the Guardian, UK:

"Land that was once used to grow food is increasingly being turned over to biofuels. This may help us to fight global warming - but it is driving up food prices throughout the world and making life increasingly hard in developing countries. Add in water shortages, natural disasters and an ever-rising population, and what you have is a recipe for disaster"

"The mile upon mile of tall maize waving to the horizon around the small Nebraskan town of Carleton looks perfect to farmers such as Mark Jagels. He and his father farm 2,500 acres (10m sq km), the price of maize - what the Americans call corn - has never been higher, and the future has seldom seemed rosier. Carleton (town motto: "The center of it all") is booming, with $200m of Californian money put up for a new biofuel factory and, after years in the doldrums, there is new full-time, well-paid work for 50 people."

"But there is a catch. The same fields that surround Jagels' house on the great plains may be bringing new money to rural America, but they are also helping to push up the price of bread in Manchester, tortillas in Mexico City and beer in Madrid. As a direct result of what is happening in places like Nebraska, Kansas, Indiana and Oklahoma, food aid for the poorest people in southern Africa, pork in China and beef in Britain are all more expensive"

"Challenged by President George Bush to produce 35bn gallons of non-fossil transport fuels by 2017 to reduce US dependency on imported oil, the Jagels family and thousands of farmers like them are patriotically turning the corn belt of America from the bread basket of the world into an enormous fuel tank. Only a year ago, their maize mostly went to cattle feed or was exported as food aid. Come harvest time in September, almost all will end up at the new plant at Carleton, where it will be fermented to make ethanol, a clear, colourless alcohol consumed, not by people, but by cars"

Link:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/g2/story/0,,2157823,00.html

It seems food prices are going up worldwide and high prices are here to stay. "The era of cheap food is over" is the chilling message of the article.

[napi21]

1. Maybe I'm just stupid, but since there's more money in farming

crops like corn, why aren't there more people doing it? I would, but what little I could grow on my 1/2 acre I'm sure wouldn't be much help, but isn't there still quite a bit of idle land, especially in the midwest, that people just quit farming because to was too expensive and the return just wasn't there? If the return is there now, why not utilize that land?

[entanglement]

5. Historically, people have moved away from agriculture to other professions, not toward it

Will we see a reversal in that trend? Maybe, given that farmers are now getting higher prices. However, there are other factors besides land (which is already being consumed by exurbia and "development") to consider. Extreme climate and water shortages are two huge challenges. Drought has devastated wheat crops worldwide this year. Raging fires have reduced the Greek harvest to ashes. We may expect more, not less of such events in the future.

The soaring demand for ethanol combined with the world's rising population will, IMHO, keep food prices high in the foreseeable future even if ex-farmers in the Midwest return to agriculture. The dismissive attitude of the elite of the world to the idea of food security makes me even less optimistic about averting a major food crisis.

[SoCalDem]

8. Somebody owns that land.. and not all available land is suited for farming

water is an issue..many sodbusters went belly-up because they had no easy access to water..

Some of the most productive land in the US is now sporting a coat of asphalt and is growing malls & McMansions :puke:

[Critters2]

10. I've lived in the Midwest my whole life,

and I don't know of any arable land that isn't being used....unless they're building unnecessary condos on it. I guess that's use, though I tend to think of it as waste. But no, we don't have a lot of empty land sitting around going to waste. Even the flood plains are farmed as much as possible. Why would anyone own land and not try to profit from it in some way?

[napi21]

14. I told you, I was probably stupid, at least on this subject. All my life

I've heard about farmers giving up that business and going into something else because they just couldn't make enough money at farming. Years ago, I know I heard about the gov't paying farmer not to plant. I haven't heard that recently though so maybe that doesn't happen anymore. I said the midwest because that's always been known as the breadbasket of the nation, but there are certainly other parts of the US that are quite suitable to growing. Calif, Fl. certainly are. Anyway, you know what I meant. Maybe if there is a profit that can now be made in that business, maybe more will return.

[SoCalDem]

15. and Calif's agri business will wither away if we ever lose cheap water

Before the huge water diversions, not much grew here.. It's all about the water.. and cheap undocumented workers..

if we had to pay fairmarket prices for water and labor, no one could afford food.:(

[Critters2]

17. When farmers moved off the land, larger, more successful farmers

bought the land and continued farming it. Or it was bought by developers for other purposes--housing, factories, malls, etc. Even the land that farmers were paid not to plant--and no, it doesn't happen as much now--didn't stand idle. They were paid to keep the land out of some crops--corn and beans around here--but could use it for silage or for certain crops of which there wasn't an overabundance. The farmers I knew planted it in oats, mostly for silage. If it's not tilled in some way, it over grows in weeds and woods, and would take forever to prep for planting when you do want to use it again.

And few farmers who left can return. Land is too expensive, and farming is too corporatized. A few are trying to go back to small family farms, organic farms and the like. But once a person's out of production agriculture, they're not likely to get back in. The investment is too great.

[BlooInBloo]

13. Barrier to entry: scale.

[LittleClarkie]

2. I've heard that it would be relatively easy to use switch grass instead

This seems odd. The corn lobby wants us to use corn, and yet the use of corn is taking a toll on the food supply?

Why don't they use something easily grown, like the aforementioned switch grass.

[SoCalDem]

4. The land necessary for switch-grass is the same land that could be cultivating food crops..no?

Arable land is the underlying issue.. Scrub land that has to be massively irrigated only attacks another commodity..water..

[LittleClarkie]

6. But doesn't switch grass just sorta grow like a weed wherever?

If one was careful with cultivation, couldn't we just harvest it where it already grows?

[SoCalDem]

7. the quantities necessary for mass production would pretty much

mean more than random harvesting..

[Critters2]

11. You'd still be using land to grow switch grass rather than food crops

So, no advantage there.

[SoCalDem]

3. Gee whiz.. I posted about this 2 years ago, and was roundly

chastised.. who-da-thunk-it?

It's just simple arithmetic..

Food animals eat..CORN
Dairy cattle eat......CORN
International aid...CORN (and wheat)
People foods........CORN..

ADM/ConAgra/Monsanto et al have been busily gobbling up "family farms" for decades.. This is NOT accidental. Just as the media industry has been shrunken to a few ultra-controlling companies, so has the farming industry. They are ALL about making money.. If the happen to feed people along the way, it;s all good, but that is NOT their primary goal.

They are in it for the MONEY..

It's also not coincidental that almost a decade has been devoted to making the petroleum industries rich, beyond anyone's imagination..

Now the clever marriage can occur..

The ones with all the money can manipulate the ones with all the grain that will be necessary for the production of the latest "product"..ethanol..

For a long time we have all been told that ethanol is cheap, easy to produce and better for the environment, but what they all forgot to emphasize, is that as more grain is diverted to ethanol production, the remaining supply left for food production will only cost more and more as the demand increases..


the small farmer cannot replace what's missing now.. There are too few of them, and they too will be swayed by the higher prices offered by the Agri-giants and Petro-guys.. Taxes have increased on farmland, and their farms have been carved up by developments during the last few decades..

Food costs more, gasoline costs more, utilities cost more, and all at the same time, real purchasing power is going down.. Clever, Indeed..(if the plan is to kill off the middle class)... Poor people have always gotten by, scrounging for the crumbs, but there are millions here who have never had to do it.. they will be sorely tested.

[entanglement]

9. Agreed. The middle class in developed nations will face a choice between food or fuel.

The poor worldwide won't even have a choice to make - they'll just starve :(

[dysfunctional press]

12. if it puts an end to hfcs, it may well be worth it.

that poison is in EVERYTHING.

[SoCalDem]

16. That would be a blessing in disguise..

Try buying anything without it..:grr: